


Two Giveaways

by drea_rev



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Angst and Humor, M/M, Sports
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-04
Updated: 2017-01-29
Packaged: 2018-08-12 23:58:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7954111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drea_rev/pseuds/drea_rev
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A WillxNursey long form fic that begins sometime around the events of this http://omgcheckplease.tumblr.com/post/103520749017 comic? It's all fuzzy in my head -_- Also yes, I both still play the PS2 and listen to The Offspring. I'm sorry. I'm not sorry. I should be asleep. Thanks for reading and just being such a great community for fanfic!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

One

 

 

Will’s ass hadn’t even hit the bus seat yet when Derek asked him for gum.

“Got any gum, Pointdexter?

Slamming his bag into the overhead bin, Will had said no.

Unfortunately, the beanie-wearing shitnugget occupying the window seat hadn’t been fazed. “You sure? You just popped one in your mouth five minutes ago.”

Will sat down, inches away from this chump, with a heavy Manning Face: lips squeezed together in a straight horizontal line. That line represented a rapidly diminishing fuse that Derek Nursey, defenseman of the Samwell Men’s Hockey team, was about to learn to recognize.

“That was my last one.”

“Yo, Pointdexter, I saw you put the package back in your pocket after taking it out. You didn’t throw it away. There was gum still in it. It’s called Doublemint, not Singlemint, bro. To encourage little boys named William to share.”

“YESTERDAY!” Will’s neck muscles tight, he screeched, “YESTERDAY IT WAS PENCILS. YESTERDAY YOU ASKED IF I HAD A PENCIL. YOU KNOW WHAT, DEREK FUCKING NURSE?! IF YOUR TRUST FUND CAN’T HANDLE YOU BUYING A FOUR DOLLAR PACK OF PENCILS AT THE CVS LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE--”

Derek had said, “Dude, chill.”

And if anything—the couple of people in the bus who had stood up and turned around—the ones who had pulled off one earbud in annoyance—the few who had stopped their casual conversation—had made Will slightly less inclined to continue in the volume he’d started the monologue in, the word ‘chill’ had the effect of a healthy splash of lighter fluid on his blaze.

“CHILL? _CHILL?!_ THAT’S _MY_ GUM THAT _I_ BOUGHT WITH _MY_ MONEY THAT _I_ EARNED, YOU AIMLESS LIBERAL POETRY MAJOR--

Somewhere, cutting through Will’s screams, came the voice of Shitty, Coach Murray, and Jack, but Coach Murray was the closest, having stood and walked to their seats, and now having grabbed Will’s shoulders. The redheaded defenseman cut off his speech instantly.

“This,” the man said with a stern voice, “Is not going to continue.”

 

 

So to a faceoff at home, specifically the coach's office, they go.

“You’re playing bad hockey,” Coach Hall begins. “You better believe I saw those two giveaways at Princeton. Chris bailed your asses out. He’s not going to do that every time.”

“Sorry, Coach,” Derek says with a nodding smile, his low-lidded eyes seeming to be designed to communicate his trademark self-unconscious hipster confidence without even all the trappings Derek is wrapped in. Will wants to make kissy noises, but he knows better.

“Sorry’s not in my vocabulary. You two were fighting on ice—about what? About something that should have been taken care of in the locker room?”

“Whenever I try to talk strategy, Nurse blows it off. Maybe he wants the team to fail ‘cause he doesn’t care,” Will mutters, then speaks up as he talks to the man next to him. “Why are you on the team anyway? You don’t give a shit about winning.”

“And how do you show how much you care about winning, Pointdexter?” Coach Hall rounds on him. “By giving the opponent shots on net? Because that’s what you did.”

Will protests, “Nurse was doing his own thing and I needed backup--”

“And you didn’t ask,” Derek said, “Why?”

“Ask?! YOU SHOULD HAVE BEEN LISTENING DURING THE STRATEGY TALK! IT WAS ALL DOWN THERE IN EXES AND OHS!” Will was on his feet, fists clenched at his sides, his voice seeming to rattle the framed photos and jerseys and articles and awards in the small office.

“So I was supposed to read your mind?” Derek rose to meet him, face-to-face. “Instead of you calling out, you just got angry at me after fact, and your nagging distracted me so that I didn’t see the Raumier kid crossing up the crea--”

“And then you fought and made a show for the entire other team,” said Coach Murray, walking in with a clipboard and tensely shutting the door.

Will and Derek fall silent, but don’t sit back down.

“Hockey is a sport where you fight. Not members of your own team. The _other_ team. How thick are both of you wads?” Murray sits beside Hall behind the desk. “My father, he knew he had a stupid kid, so the first day I put on my skates he told me: ‘ _this is a puck, push it that way, the people in similar clothing are your team_.’”

Involuntarily, both defensemen chuckle, then trade glares.

“You’re not at Boston Public anymore, Pointdexter. And you’re not at Andover anymore, Nurse. You’ve graduated into a unique hockey environment you should be grateful for. Limits that existed for you before are no longer there. You don’t wang your head on the ceiling here, you decide its height yourself. And the two of you clowns are keeping yours pretty damn low.”

“I wanted to win the Princeton game!” Will says, from his heart. “Damn it, I wanted to! I paid attention to every strategy meeting we had!”

“Strategy isn’t everything,” Derek says, gritting his teeth, “The best laid plans of mice and men...can fail. The game can change in a damned heartbeat. You have to think for yourself.”

Just as Will is about to rip into Derek for such a cocky, vague, amateurish remark, Coach Hall stands up. “You’re both right. And I’m proud of you for seeing that.”

“What?” Will says, turning, blinking, and next to him, Derek blinks in unison, his impassive veneer momentarily breached.

“The game of hockey needs both a mind and a heart to play it. And that means both listening to strategy and recognizing when you have to improvise. So combine your strengths and you’ll find you can complement each other in play style,” Coach Murray says.

In the shocked silence following, Coach Hall says, “That...was beautiful, Chuck, but how many episodes of Naruto did you and your son watch last night?”

Out of the corner of his mouth, Coach Hall says, “ _Michael_. Not _now_.”

 

 

 

“Show me how to lie,” Will sings along with the beat-up 90s boombox sitting on the bench as he slaps at a line of pucks, “YOU’RE GETTING BETTER ALL THE TIME,”

Chowder flits to the side, hits the splits and glove-saves, snatches them out of their way to the corner. Will keeps swinging, his shots beginning to hit to the song’s wild beat.

“ANOTHER CLEVER WORD SETS OFF AN UNEXPECTED HERD, AND AS YOU STEP BACK INTO LINE, A MOB JUMPS TO ITS FEET.” Will is in the zone, like he gets when he’s leapt off the couch at home with the PS2 controller in his hands, knowing he can do anything.

“NOW DANCE, FUCKER, DANCE...” The most explosive drum bits are interrupted for Will by a set of arms gliding in front of him, attached to a stick, the tape of which strikes the next puck in the row he’s set up, carefully, because he hates the look of pucks that aren’t in a straight line against the pale ice. The other pucks are jostled into non-uniform format as it flies off the stick, a perfect slapshot, and somehow winds up past Chowder’s glove and in the upper left corner of the net. The goalie turns sheepishly to look at it as Derek gives Will a smug grin.

“’you never had a chance,’” The defenseman mouths, along with the song, “’and no one even knew’” he leans down and strikes another puck at Chowder, “’it was really only you’.”

Will’s teeth are grinding. “NICE WORK YOU DID!” He screams, letting a puck fly at Chowder so fast he can almost see the flames behind it. “YOU’RE GONNA GO FAR--” He body-checks Derek out of the way and snatches up the next puck, “KIIIIIID!”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I honestly don't know how these things happen but here's an awesome song for you to listen to while reading this for the full experience: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=42NIPZh01_E  
> Have a safe Labor Day everyone (or a safe anyday, if you're not in the US) and take care

TWO

 

 

 

Will can’t really dance, but he’s been dealing with nothing but blue screens of death and incomprehensible code problems all day and “Uncle Tommy” by the Rumjacks just came up on his Youtube playlist after song after song by the Dropkick Murphys. What he does is a sort of sway slash dougie slash wriggle slash spinning his Samwell hoodie over his head like he’s a helicopter while singing,

“’ _Early one November me Uncle Tommy joined the army,_  
_Kitted him out for danger & ferried him o'er the sea,_  
 _He threw me o'er his shoulder, sang to me a dirty ditty,_

 _Telling me when I were older ‘you'll be just like me_ ,’”

He does this while his roommate is folding laundry, having left the dorm room door open. He’s too deep in badass Irish banjo falsetto to notice Derek walking into his room holding a mid-size box, but when he sees it, sees the black Amazon Prime tape that defines it as yet another luxury item he cannot acquire, he pays attention.

_A half a bottle o' whisky, tattoo of a pretty lady,  
Half a dozen Havanas  & his Aunties rosary,_

Derek rips off the tape and casts it past Will into the trash can by his desk. He watches it fall as if in slow motion: it costs ninety nine dollars to have that magical branded tape bring your Amazon shipments to you in a timely manner as opposed to the weeks it took Will to receive his discount textbooks.

Inside the box, which is now on Will’s bed, are: six cases of Doublemint gum. Derek opens the box fully so he can pick one out, open up its triangular easy-tab, and grab a handful of bright green packages of gum messily in one hand, which he then slaps into Will’s face as if he was hitting him with a pie.

Then Derek runs away.

_A-thunderin' oe'r the border, guns a-blazin', hells a-raisin',  
Here I am ya bastards, ye'll no be havin' me!_

 

 

_Tommy was a rifle, Tommy was a razor,_

Will whips past two screeching freshmen, dives over the hedge Derek vaulted, follows the full-tilt-running Andover alum down Lake Quad’s main avenues.

_Tommy was a ramblin' man,_

Derek leaps down from the bridge and shocks a study group, scatters geese as he tries to disappear into the sparse trees by the pond.

_A silver blade in the dyin' shade,  
Oor Tommy was a fightin' man!_

“DEREK FUCKIN’ NURSE!” screams Will, barrelling out of an alleyway between the Founders’ buildings and knocking Derek off course. But then his opponent jumps, just leaps into the air, grabs a tree branch above him with one arm—Will watches the arm lift him up, mid-stride, the slim fit sleeve showing off the muscles beneath Nursey’s tattoo—and spins in the air, throwing himself down in another direction, and keeping his momentum from the moment his foot hits the earth again, some Sabastien Foucan shit Will pretends not to know about, pretends not to have spent hours dreaming of doing since he saw that scene in the James Bond movie.

“Goddamnit!” Will yells, his sneakers ripping at the grass, “You took those parkour classes at Brookline Boulders, didn’t you?! I’d take those _if I had the money_!”

 

 

_The following December he sent a card to Auntie Annie,_

Half a mile away from Will’s dorm, Derek slows, falls into a jog, then stops, between the highway and a small path leading to Murder Stop and Shop, which is down a slight incline of woods. The absence of footfalls behind him tell him it’s safe to take a break to rudely spit out his throat boogers, which he begins to hack to do, scaring a nearby old person.

_Tellin' her he were frozen half to death upon a hill,_

Dex slams into Derek’s back, latching onto him like a wrestler, as the defenseman is pitched forward and hits the dry parking lot grass, beginning to tumble.

_He earn't his scars in German bars,  
And breakin' the hearts o' the maids o' Norway,_

Dex and Nursey rolled together, swearing, punching, and ripping at clothes like Kindergarteners, making people push their carts in the other direction as they rolled into the ditch.

“Tommy was a rifle,” Will muttered, not even having his eyes opened anymore but punching anything that felt remotely sweaterlike and preppy, “Tommy was a razor, Tommy was a—a ram—rambling--”

He heard the sound of Derek breathing. Of Derek being out of breath. He forced his eyes open. He was lying on top of the defenseman, surrounded by leaves. Derek’s brown eyes caught the fading light from over the supermarket as they shined up at him, occasionally blinking.

_Quick with a pound when yer luck was down,  
Oor Tommy was a Jerry can._

“You want some food?” Derek said, jerking his head left.

“You’re going to _give_ it to me?” Will said, slowly, angrily, confusedly, especially since the D-man’s hands were around his neck.

“How does that song end?”

For some reason, instead of telling Derek to shut up, instead of standing up and walking away, instead of doing anything sensible, or anything else, Will obliged him:

“’ _Early one November me Uncle Tommy left the army,_  
_Stripped him o' his regalia & ferried him o'er the main,_  
 _He took me by the shoulder, sang to me a dirty ditty,_  
 _bastards only love ye when ye're shootin' at yer ain’!”_

 


	3. Poems and Pies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dex wants to be free of Nursey's Nursey-ness, and when Bitty proposes a seating change on the bus, he gets his wish. It's just what the doctor ordered, but who knew it had these side effects? Warning for homophobia, internalized homophobia, as this story comes from Dex's point of view.

“Dex, before you put your bag up--would you like to switch seats?”

Dex turned, duffel raised to the overhead compartment, to see Bittle’s familiar, sunny face, looking concerned.

“Just so...you know, y’all don’t get in another fight,” Bittle said, lowering his voice near the end.

Dex said, in disbelief, “You—you’re serious? I can go—sit with Jack?”

He sounded, he realized, a bit too enthusiastic. Bittle smiled, relief showing on his face. “Yes. I’ll just go get my bag.”

“Thanks, Bittle.”

 

 

Jack was a dream to ride next to. As Massachusetts rivers and woods and boring-looking towns flew past outside, he didn’t look up from a history documentary he was watching on his laptop, except to exchange pleasantries and polite smalltalk with Dex.

The in-bus wifi was apparently working for once. The Boston kid couldn’t believe his luck. He would get to tell all his relatives on facebook that he sat next to Jack Zimmermann. Dex even got to doze off for a bit, and when he woke up with the sensation of a full bladder, he stood up and headed back, swaying a bit with the bus.

That’s when he heard soft giggles and murmurs.

He was passing his usual seat when he noticed the curtain had been pulled closed, and Nursey had his arm around Bittle’s shoulders, and Bittle was pointing at something on Nursey’s Macbook and looking embarrassed. Nursey was beaming.

“--Derek Malik Nurse, we were supposed to watch those silly infomercials! How did we get here? You said it was the last one a few videos ago!”

“Come on, Bits!” Nursey murmured, “You’re so different in your vlogs! It’s like you really express yourself, man!”

“I can’t stand looking at my old videos. Lord, I didn’t even have a tripod back then!”

Dex locked himself into the bathroom and peed, blinking, trying to hold the image in his mind of Nursey’s arm around Bittle.

 

 

It was when Bittle’s line was on the ice that Dex turned and spoke to Nursey again. In a whisper, so he could barely be heard above the yelling, clattering, skating noises reverberating around UVM’s rink.

“You know that guy’s gay, right, Nursey?”

He’d composed his face into a perfect half-smirk, half-grimace when he said it, and was surprised when Nursey’s face did the opposite, hardly changed in his helmet at all, just a flick of eyes over to meet Dex’s. His head didn’t even turn.

“And he’s pretty good-looking too.”

Dex choked out a gasp, then started coughing, proceeding to make sure only he heard Nursey’s next words.

“Not like Chowder, but he’s taken.”

“What,” hissed Dex. He twitched as he slid away from Nursey on the bench, only a few inches. “What the fuck, Nursey? What are you—women are good-looking, not--”

“I didn’t say they weren’t.”

“So are you--”

“Nurse, Pointdexter, line change,” Coach Hall said, just as Ransom and Holster, faces flushed, practically leapt back into the bench.

“Good luck with these fuckin’ mountain people,” Holster spat.

“Hey, you did great, bro!” Ransom said, patting him on the back.

Nursey vaulted off the bench and hit the ice smoothly. Dex, somehow, trudged after him, words wanting to spill out, maybe blows wanting to spill out.

As it was, he glared at the faceoff circle from the blue line and muttered, “Fuckin’ Samwell.”

 

 

On Family Day, Dex walked into Faber and was surprised to see a square-shouldered, big, heavily mustached man talking to Bittle, who looked incredibly serious for once. Dex’s parent’s couldn’t pay for the trip up, as usual, so he just got onto the ice to limber up, take advantage of the space while the others chatted it up with their families. Chowder soon joined him and Dex helped him get into the zone with some chips from different spots in the ice, and he kept glancing over at Bittle for some reason—he thought he saw both men looking at him at some point.

“Hey, Bittle, can’t we run some plays real quick?” He needed defensive practice more than scoring anyway.

“Sure, one sec!” Bittle slipped onto the ice fluidly, snatched up a puck, got it past Dex a few times, even though Chowder saved it. Dex started to get angry. His warmup was making him worse, not better.

“Who’s that guy?” Dex asked.

“Coach! Oh, I mean, dad!” Bittle said, smiling.

“ _That’s_ your dad?” Dex said, but then he saw Chowder and Bittle smiling at something behind him, and he turned.

Jack Zimmermann was holding a tall, svelte blond woman’s hand as he came onto the ice, slowly skating ahead, allowing her to get her bearings. It seemed like she definitely knew how to skate, it might just have been a while since she’d been on the ice. Her eyes were dazzling, and as she and Jack skated together, smiling at one another, Jack leading them in circles once she seemed comfortable, it hit Dex that their resemblance was outstanding.

“Alicia Zimmermann,” Bittle murmured, and Dex saw him leaning his chin on his stick. “She cuts such a graceful figure on the ice!”

_Like you’d know_ , Dex thought.

But then he saw something behind Bittle, and his jaw dropped.

It was Nursey. He was talking to two much less-tall women, one with a hooked nose, the other wearing a hijab, and he seemed to be acting a moron. He was spinning around on one leg on the ice, and then falling onto the other, apparently to elecit concern from the two women, who wore matching expressions of worry every time he did it.

Dex had moved toward them without thinking, and then he could hear what they were saying.

“--don’t do that, my heart won’t take it, please, Derek,” said one of the women, in a very strong foreign accent.

“It’s all right, Mom! Just chill,” Nursey laughed, enveloping her in a hug. “I love you. I would never put myself in real danger.”

“But you’re so clumsy at home, and anything can happen on the ice,” said the other woman shrewdly, her eyes narrowed. “I watch those videos of so many players getting so many injuries, all chasing that stupid puck. You are worth so much, my baby.”

“Stop watching those videos, then, mama,” Nursey quipped back.

Dex almost broke his stick in two.


End file.
